


Waking Up

by K_E_D



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Torture, post season 3B
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-04
Updated: 2017-02-04
Packaged: 2018-09-21 22:50:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9570257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/K_E_D/pseuds/K_E_D
Summary: "It was more like a nightmare...""If this is all a dream, why do you look so worried?""Because I don't remember waking up."





	

**Author's Note:**

> This story takes place after the Season 3b finale, when Kate returns. As of right now there is only one chapter and the story is completed, though I may add onto it in the future. For now, I just wanted to get it out there. Hope you enjoy.
> 
> *Please read the warnings and tags*

_“It was more like a nightmare…”_

_Shots are firing all around him as he dodges, vision blurred by the smoke filling the room.  He holds back the urge to cough, not wanting the hunters to find his hiding space._

_“Derek, if this is all a dream, why do you look so worried?”_

_He stares at the floor for a moment before glancing up at the boy, fear coursing through him._

_“Because I don’t remember waking up.  So tell me.  How do you know?  How do you know if you’re still dreaming?”_

_“Your fingers - you have extra fingers in dreams.”_

_Not trusting his body not to lie to him, he grabs Stiles’ wrist and holds it up.  Derek counts his fingers and then counts again._

_“Six.”_

Derek groans as the wolfsbane continues to spread, poisoning his already vulnerable system.

_“You’re real…”_

She was real and she was alive.  It hadn’t been another hallucination.  For years after the fire, after Laura’s death, after Kate tortured him in the basement his family died in, he saw her everywhere - in everything.  She was the barista in the coffee shop, the woman crossing the street, his neighbor coming home from work, even the anchorwoman on the local news.

But this wasn’t just his imagination.  Kate was alive and she had him again.  He can’t decide what’s worse - that his nightmare is real or that it’s worse than he could have imagined.  She no longer needs weapons to subdue him, she’s strong enough all on her own.  Her skin ripples blue and her eyes are a fluorescent green.  He’s never seen anything like her.

“You’re awake,” she purrs from the darkened corner.

Derek has no idea where they are, only that it’s hot and dusty.  The middle of the desert maybe.  None of that really matters anyway.  The only thing that keeps pulling his focus again and again is the wolfsbane racing through his body.

“I thought I’d have to wake you myself.  You should be glad it didn’t come to that,” she says.

Kate strolls forward, cattle prod lighting up in her hand.  Though she no longer needed it, she still seemed to like the agony it brought him.  If Derek could free himself from these burning ropes, he’d slash her throat open and make sure it stuck this time.

“Then again,” she says.  “Now that you’re awake, it’s time to play, so maybe you shouldn’t be _too_ glad.”

A dark laugh seeps from her mouth, but it’s drowned out when his ears ring from the shock that goes through him.  She’d pressed the end of the prod into this shoulder and he grits his teeth, not wanting to give her the satisfaction of hearing him scream.  Her eyes narrow to slits and her lips pull in an even harsher smirk.

Kate jabs it into the middle of his chest, his side right under his already cracked ribs, and his bare hip.  She leans in close, smiling up at him, as she licks over the stings, making him hiss as they burn further.

“Come on, Der, don’t hold back on me,” she whispers.

He bites his tongue bloody in retaliation, feeling like his silence is the one thing he still has control over.  The prod shocks against his lower abdomen and he curls forward with a groan.  He’s panting harshly, arms and wrists sore from taking the full weight of his body.  He shifts, trying to swing away from her, but she shocks him in the thigh in retribution.

“If you’re a good boy, that won’t happen anymore,” she says with a sigh.

Her warm breath wafts over his stomach and he tilts his head back to stare at the ceiling to avoid looking at her.  Kate snickers before he feels her tongue lap around his pelvis, just above his waistband.  He closes his eyes and waits for it to be over.   _It has to end sometime_ .  This is what he tells himself day in and day out.   _It has to end sometime_.

Derek flinches when too sharp teeth graze along his naval, nipping at his burning skin.

When he feels her fingers playing with his zipper, he lets himself fall back into his own head.  Blocking her out, he focuses on the dreams that keep plaguing him in this place.  He focuses on Stiles’ voice in his head, on the way his limbs move in spastic spurts, on how it feels every time his surprisingly large and steady hands are on him.  Like the time he held him up in the pool for hours and didn’t let him drown no matter what he said or did.  Or when he killed Boyd and his anchor had suddenly vanished in a wave of despair so strong he almost blacked out.  Stiles had been there, his hand landing gently on his shoulder, pulling him back from the edge.  In the elevator after he came to, again with his hand on his shoulder, pulling him together and getting him to safety.

Derek is shocked back to reality when pain shoots through his groin.  It’s a burning like he’s never felt before, stronger than the wolfsbane still swimming through him.  Derek can’t hold back his scream this time, his wolf surfacing in an effort to dull the pain.  He shifts back and forth, unable to control it; unable to bear it as either human or wolf.

He blacks out again, Kate’s words of “Such a good boy for me” fading away.

Derek doesn’t fight the dreams this time.  He welcomes the visions of Stiles, of his anchor, as they flip through his subconscious.

* * *

 

“Derek?  Are you here?”

He tries to lift his head, but his muscles only spasm painfully.  Trying to speak proves useless as well.  Derek desperately wants to call out, wants to latch onto the hallucination his mind has conjured up for him.  He hears another pair of feet rushing toward him, which is odd.  There’s never anyone but Stiles in his dreams.

Someone curses and then there’s shouting back and forth.  Hands gently cup his face, making him whine and try to pull away.  It’s not Stiles, it has to be her, she’s the only one he ever feels.

“Can you hear me?  Open your eyes, Derek.”

He stops his feeble attempts at pulling away and forces his lids open.  His vision is blurry from the wolfsbane that’s still slowly killing him and the electric current continuously jabbing him in the side.  At some point, Kate had gotten bored with the prod and hooked him up to a very familiar machine.  She left it on low while she went to hunt down dinner.  His body had long since gone numb from it.

The power is shut off and he sags, wrists bleeding from the ropes digging in.  When hands touch him again, he flinches badly at the sensation on his sensitive skin.  He instantly wishes the electricity was back and keeping him numb.

“Hey, hey, it’s alright.  We’re gonna get you down.”

The wires are ripped out of his side and the person curses again, apologizing profusely when he lets out a weak pained shout.  Fingers grab at his waist to keep him from swinging, but he panics at the touch.  He barely registers the whimpers as his own and the person quickly puts their hands back on his face.

“Derek, it’s just me, it’s Stiles.”

His eyes flutter back open at that and he makes out the blurred lines of the boy’s face.

“Stiles?” he rasps.

His throat is raw from screaming, but he doesn’t even care.  He tries his best to keep his eyes open and can only pray that this is real and not another dream.  Derek tries to ask if he’s real, but loses his breath as another wave of pain courses through him.  He grits his teeth, not wanting to scream in front of Stiles in case this is truly real.

“Yeah, it’s me, we’re getting you out of here.  Just hold on a few more minutes, okay?”

Derek struggles to nod, but his muscles protest again.

“Scott, hurry up with that,” the boy hisses.

“I’m trying.  It’s coated in wolfsbane or something.”

Stiles huffs and suddenly takes his hands off.  The wolf whimpers and when he can feel Stiles moving further away, he out right sobs.  It was just a dream.  He’s not really here.  It’s only in his head.

“Whoa, hey, Derek, you’re gonna be alright,” Scott says.

That was still confusing him.  His mind never conjured up Scott before.  He wishes it had done it sooner.  Maybe if he’d had both his anchor and his Alpha to keep him company, he wouldn’t have lost his mind so quickly - or so completely.

The ropes that’d been holding him up suddenly go slack and his arms flop down around someone's shoulders.  He tries to scent whoever it is, but all he can smell is the odor of his own dying body.  As he’s maneuvered onto the floor, he starts trembling as he succumbs to the wolfsbane in his system.

“What do we do?” Scott asks, his voice tight.

“It’s gotta be the wolfsbane, right?  Look for any open wounds.”

If Derek could speak, he’d tell him not to bother, that she didn’t use bullets or knives.

“Dude, there aren’t any!” Scott shouts.

“Fuck, okay, let’s get him to the jeep.  Stay focused.  She could come back.”

The wolf tries unsuccessfully to stifle a groan as the two boys lift him from the ground.  His dreams were never painful, never left him feeling this vulnerable.  Either his subconscious has started to break under the pressure and begun supplying him with some vivid nightmares, or this rescue is really happening.  Derek’s eyes fall closed and he doesn’t fight it.  He listens to their heartbeats and then the quiet desert around him as they make it outside.

“Is that him?” someone asks.

“Yeah, help us get him in,” Stiles says, panting.

He’s eventually laid down in the backseat, nestled in someone's lap as another person takes his hand.  The people around him discuss who rides with who before doors are closing and engines are rumbling to life.  Derek pries his eyes open again, finding it to be Stiles’ lap he’s resting in and the hand holding his to be Lydia.  She stares back at him, thumb rubbing across his hand, making his skin prickle.  Lydia’s speaking softly into her phone and he figures it’s probably Deaton.

Stiles starts running fingers through his hair and he shivers at the gentle touch.  He lets his eyes fall closed again and doesn’t fight the darkness that pulls at him.

* * *

 

Derek jolts awake, a scream ripping its way out of his throat.  He gulps in air as fast as he can when he realizes he’s not in the coffin, nor the temple, but a familiar bedroom.  Still, his mind whirls in confusion, flashes of those dark and sometimes small spaces speeding through his vision.  Derek screams again, convinced it’s all a dream, that he’s going to wake up any minute with her hands on his body, her claws digging into places they should never be.

“Derek!”

The bedroom door had crashed open, but he hadn’t even heard it.  His own strained voice had drowned it out.

“Derek, you’re okay, you’re safe.”

Hands flutter nervously around him before landing gently on his shoulders.  They’re warm and wide, so unlike the cold ones that keep trailing over his stomach, over his thighs, over his-

Derek chokes on his next breath in, trying to hold back another reflexive scream.  He still doesn’t know where he is, though it’d looked familiar only a minute ago.

“Where am I?  Where am I?  Where-”

One of the hands moves to his chest, a steady warmth over his pounding heart.

“Hey, breathe, you’re okay.  You’re in my room.  You’re safe.”

Derek finally looks to his right, sees the person speaking to him.  It’s Stiles; of course it’s Stiles.  He’s still breathing hard, but his mind is clearing somewhat.

“You came for me,” he mutters weakly.

The tension around Stiles’ eyes increases, his lips clearly trying to pull into a less worried smile, but not managing it.

“Yeah, we came for you.”

But that’s not what Derek meant.  There’s never any ‘we’ in this situation, there’s never any ‘we’ anchoring him in his dreams; never anyone but Stiles holding him in the deep pit of his subconscious.

“You,” he whispers.  He reaches out, a little shocked to feel his body so weak, and tugs a bit at the cotton fabric of Stiles’ shirt.

“What?”

“You saved me,” he says, voice tight.

Once he says it out loud, it’s as if it finally sinks in.  He let’s out a long breath, shaking as he relaxes back against the mattress.

“You saved me,” he whispers again.  He lets his eyes flutter closed again, the soft touch of Stiles’ hands easing him back to sleep.

* * *

 

When he wakes again, it’s far less dramatic, but not any less confusing.  He has to look around the bedroom for several minutes until he’s positive of where he is.  It’s Stiles’ room, that much he knows.  He’s not sure how long he was asleep.

Derek tries to ignore the clenching in his gut telling him that he’s still not even sure this is real.  He would count his fingers, but he learned months ago that his body wasn’t to be trusted.  It lied to him in the dreams - let him believe he _wasn’t_.

There was only one way he was going to be sure.  Dragging himself off the warm mattress, he sways up onto his feet and stumbles towards the door.  He vaguely notices the soft clothing wrapped around him with both Stiles and Scott’s scents heavy in the folds.  It’s calming in a way he would have never expected.

Making his way down the stairs, he’s a little surprised to find so many people huddled in the living room.  Most he recognizes as pack, but there are a few new faces that have him wary to come further inside.

“You’re awake.”

_She purrs lowly, her breasts heaving with the movement._

He twitches at the words, but manages to hold in the groan at the back of his throat.

Stiles’ voice registers and skitters warmly from where he emerges from the small kitchen.  He hands over a mug of what smells like some kind of tea.  Derek’s gaze lingers on his hand as it retreats, quickly taking stock of how many digits it holds.

_Five.  There’s only five fingers.  I’m awake._

The kid’s brow twitches curiously and Derek quickly looks away, his face heating with embarrassment.  He shouldn’t need to rely on counting someone else’s fingers just to know what’s real and what’s not.  Derek knows that Stiles is the whole reason his brain came up with the solution in the first place, having heard the stories of the Nogitsune, but it still made him feel weak.

“Deaton said he shouldn’t be on his feet yet,” Lydia says.

She’s perched in a large black recliner, her legs mostly bare and crossed at the knee.  Her too-sharp gaze travels over him, her glossed lips in a firm line.  Derek doesn’t know her very well, but he can’t help think she looks _concerned_.  He hasn’t forgotten how she’d held his hand in the car as they rescued him.  It was unnerving and he wanted her to stop scrutinizing his every move, every twitch.

“That was if he wasn’t healing though, right?  He looks better than earlier,” Kira retorts.

The kitsune is leaning against the window, the sun’s rays shining around her much like her aura normally does.  Derek still isn’t sure what to make of her and he doesn’t remember if she’d been part of his rescue.

“He smells sick.”

This from someone he’d tried not to think about while he was held captive.  It’s not that Derek wasn’t curious about her, but he’d lost enough family for a lifetime.  If he got to know Malia, let her in and lost her too, he didn’t think he’d survive it.  Still, he can’t help his eyes from roaming over her, taking her in.  She’s slouched on a bench by the staircase, her hair in a messy braid that drapes over her shoulder.  Her nose twitches and her brows furrow as she stares back at him.  Derek quickly looks away, not knowing how to handle her.

“Deaton also said that was normal.  Most importantly, how are you feeling?” Scott asks, also strolling in from the kitchen.

Derek holds back a flinch, making sure to keep his face as neutral as possible.  Physically, he is sore like he’s never known, in places he’s never thought could be sore.  All of his senses are hyper alert, making him feel even more on edge than he needs to be.  There’s a strange halo around the artificial lights, the collective pounding of everyone’s heartbeats is giving him a headache - which should be impossible -, the scent of jasmine wafting up from his mug is making his stomach roll, and no matter how much he focuses on the heat from said mug, there’s a chill wracking his body.

“Fine,” he mutters, jaw clenched.

He was too distracted to cover the lie and too tired to worry about the raised brows he gets from the majority of the room.

“Good,” Argent pipes up from the table in the corner.  “Then you can help us.”

“Chris, I thought we agreed to wait,” the Sheriff interrupts.  Deep lines course along his face as he scowls at the other man.

Derek lets his gaze trace over him, picking out every useless detail as a distraction.  He wouldn’t admit it out loud, but having Chris in the room was making him jittery, more so than usual.

“The longer we wait, the more details he might forget,” Chris says.

Derek’s vision goes fuzzy at the edges and his heart painfully skips a beat.  For a moment he thinks the wolfsbane must still be in his system as his entire ribcage constricts, but he blinks rapidly and the sensation is gone.  He tenses his muscles when he feels his balance sway.

When he regains his focus, the entire room is staring at him nervously.  Even Argent’s stern expression softens a fraction before smoothing out again a second later.  The hunter clears his throat and shifts his attention to the papers strewn across the table.

“What do you need from me?” Derek asks quietly.

He steadily ignores the way his hand shakes around the mug as well as Scott’s concerned gaze a few feet away.

Argent frowns and refuses to look at him.

“I know this may be difficult for you and I’ll try to be as gentle as I can-”

“Don’t,” Derek snaps, his voice still just as quiet.  Argent glances up, brows furrowed.  “Don’t do that.  I don’t need you to be-” he huffs, gaze skittering away.  “I can handle this.  I’m not _broken_ ,” he says tersely.

He can see his pack members shift nervously, clearly wanting to comfort him or something, but he glares at them like he used to way back when.  The hunter, however, only nods in acceptance and proceeds.  Derek lets his breath out slowly and presses his shoulder blades against the wall at his back to prepare himself.  He could handle this, just like he handled everything else.   _He was not broken_.

“First thing’s first, we need to know what exactly we’re up against.  Last I knew, she was dead and buried.  We learned from the Calaveras’-”

_“Now, my friend, you’re gonna tell us about la loba.  Where is the she-wolf?”_

“-that she’s been turned.  Turned into what?” he asks.

_“You’re real.”_

Derek’s chest burns at the memory of buckshot slamming into him and splintering.  It’s better to focus on that, than the lingering sensation of her sharp talons digging into his skin.

“I’m not sure.  She’s not a werewolf or a kanima.  She’s nothing I’ve ever seen before.”

Derek takes a quick sip of his tea even though the scent of it is still making him nauseous.  He just needed something to do other than stand here and talk about any of this.

“Okay.  She must be a type of shifter, though, if our theories are correct.  We’re assuming when Peter attempted to kill her by ripping her throat out, he actually turned her instead.”

Derek figured as much.  He hadn’t had much time to wonder about it while she held him captive, but it was fairly obvious.  It was the only possible explanation.  It was also yet another reason to put Peter in the fucking ground again.

“So tell me what she looked like.”

Derek tells him of how her skin was a velvety blue with black markings, how her eyes shone a neon green, how her claws and fangs were longer and thinner than his own and yet sharper.

_Too sharp teeth graze along his naval, nipping at his burning skin._

A shudder wracks through him and he presses harder against the wall to steady himself.  He inhales the unpleasant jasmine, letting it pull his focus away.  Though in that moment with her he’d tried to block out what she was doing, he knows the memory is still there, waiting for him to acknowledge it.

“It doesn’t sound familiar,” Chris mutters, shaking his head.  “I’ll look through the bestiary later.  For now, we need to know where she took you besides the temple and any other places she may have mentioned.”

_His claws drag against the wood again and again.  Derek roars as he pushes against it - first with his raw palms and then his bare feet.  The roof won’t budge, just as the sides of this prison hadn’t for days.  It was so dark even his heightened eyesight couldn’t make out the majority of his surroundings.  All he knew was that it was small, dark, and wooden._

_A coffin._

The edges of his vision are fuzzy again and it’s more difficult to bring it back into focus.  That crushing weight had come and gone again, making his breath stutter both in and out.  He shakes it off, but can feel his left brow twitching.  It was some kind of tick he’d developed after the first few weeks with Kate, but he’d been able to keep it under control until now.  He runs his index finger over it briefly to try to stop it.

“Derek, the locations?” Argent prods quietly.

“We stayed in the preserve for a while.”

“But we searched there,” Stiles protests.  “ _Several_ times.”

Derek looks to him and says “Guess you just missed me.”  It came out bitter and the kid frowns, his eyes ticking away and heart skipping.

He didn’t mean to throw guilt on anyone, but he’ll admit that the few weeks that Kate and her lackeys spent dragging him from one hiding spot to the next in his own territory were laced with resentment.  He’d been there long enough that _someone_ from this pack - hell, someone from _the police department_ \- should have been able to fucking find him.  It’s not like Kate had been picking tricky hiding places.  There’d been an entire 3 days where she just tied him to a tree like bait.

“Where else?” Argent asks.  He’s frowning down at his map again, drawing a thick black circle around the preserve.

Derek brings the warm mug to his lips and sips at the foul smelling tea.

“The d-depot,” he mutters.  He pretends he didn’t stutter over the word and thankfully no one calls him out on it.

“The abandoned depot?  How?  We checked there too,” Scott says.

_Derek tries to fight it, but he can’t.  His hips snap forward frantically, slamming her into the train car, which rocks precariously on its rusty wheels._

_“That’s it, sweetie, right there,” Kate groans._

_He answers all her sighs and moans with his own, the sounds being ripped out of him.  She digs her claws deep into his back as she snarls her way to yet another climax.  Derek follows her over the edge, pushing into her as deep as he can as he trembles through it.  He thinks that’s it, that_ **_has_ ** _to be it._

_Kate lets out a giddy laugh as she squeezes around his still hard cock.  Derek groans and shakes his head frantically.  He doesn’t want this, but his body keeps telling him otherwise.  Gripping her hips, he tries to wrench himself away, to pull out of her._

_She tsks at him disapprovingly and grabs a fistful of his hair._

_“Not so fast.  I told you.  You’re going to fuck me until it wears off,” she says lowly.  Derek’s heart stutters and his body rocks closer to her at the command._

_“And then?” she whispers in his ear.  “Maybe I’ll give you more.  Maybe I’ll just keep sticking the needle in until you’re dying of dehydration.  How does that sound, Der?”_

Derek’s knees nearly buckle, making the tea slosh over the rim of the mug.  The only thing that keeps him standing is someone rushing to his side to grab him by the shoulders.

“Steady now,” the Sheriff mutters.  

The man guides him towards the couch and Derek doesn’t even fight it, too exhausted to do anything but let his legs give out.  He flops onto the cushion and quickly tries to get his heart rate under control.  Everything was fine, _he_ was fine.  He didn’t know why he even thought of that.  It was over.  He wasn’t in the depot anymore, he wasn’t _with_ her.  Derek shakes his head a bit to refocus.  He’s supposed to be telling them more locations.

“Maybe Lydia’s right.  Maybe you should get some more sleep,” the Sheriff says.

The man was hovering by his side, deep frown still etched into his face, the cup of tea safely in his grasp.  Derek didn’t understand why he was involved in this, why he was clearly helping him.

“I’m fine,” he snaps.  He doesn’t know whether it’s his tone or expression that eventually has the Sheriff backing off with a sigh.

“That can’t be it,” Argent mutters.  He looks up from the map.  “By our timetable you disappeared in April.  That was _nine_ months ago.  There’s no way she kept you _in town_ that entire time without any of us noticing,” he says.

Nine months.  Kate had him for _nine_ _months_.

“Obviously that isn’t it,” Lydia says with a roll of her eyes.  “We found him in Mexico.  You can’t get from A to _D_ without in-betweens, so let him finish.”

The hunter doesn’t rise to her tone as Derek would’ve thought.  In fact, he barely acknowledges her.  His gaze stays on Derek and he says nothing in response to her reprimand.  While Derek finds this all fascinating, his brain is still stuck on the fact that it’s apparently December.  An entire spring, summer, and fall went by without him noticing.

But no, he does remember the summer.  The sun shining bright and too hot.  Kate dragging him up onto the deck, his balance swaying with-

“A boat.  She has a boat,” he says quickly.

“Do you know where-”

“No,” he says, voice nearly a shout.

His stomach lurches and he’s sure he’s going to be sick.  Derek takes deeper breaths to stave it off, or at least that’s what he tells himself.  He resolutely ignores how his lungs feel tight, how there doesn’t seem to be enough air.

“Okay.  Is there anywhere else?” Argent asks quietly.

“Caves.  Underground.  Between here and Mexico,” he says in a rush.

Maybe if he just gets it all out quick enough he won’t have to think about it.

“Do you remember where you entered or exited the caves?  Any landmarks or-?”

“No, no, I don’t remember,” he snaps.

His right knee had starting bouncing at some point, his left brow was still twitching, and his skin was starting to burn.  Derek needed to move, to get the fuck out of here.  He needed to run until his legs gave out again, until his lungs shriveled up more than they already were.

“Maybe we should stop,” Lydia says.

“But we haven’t gotten to the temple yet,” Malia argues.

The fingers of his left hand pick at the loose threading on the arm of the couch.

“We stopped again before the temple.”

“Where?” Argent asks, scribbling on his map.

“The desert somewhere, I’m not sure.”

“What makes you think that?  Did you see it - the desert, I mean?”

_Light seeps in and he tries to scramble further into his tight box, the brightness burning his retinas._

_“You ready to come out and play, baby?”_

“No, I, uh, I didn’t see it,” he murmurs.  He smooths a finger over his twitching brow again.  “But it was hot all the time and dusty.  She tracked some kind of sand in sometimes…”

Derek trembles and tries to pretend he can’t hear the way her claws scraped along the stone floor, the sand grating beneath her feet.

“Alright.  Were you in a building - a house, a factory-?”

“A building maybe, I don’t know,” he interrupts.

He fails miserably at hiding his flinch this time and gives up on controlling his ticking eyebrow.  His limbs felt restless and that weight on his chest was compressing down on his ribs again, threatening to strangle him.

“Do you think it was by the temple?” Chris ponders.  He jots down some notes on a pad as he thinks.

“I don’t know,” Derek repeats, a sub vocal growl edging into his words.

Chris sighs and throws the pad onto the table.

“You don’t seem to know much at all, Derek.  If we’re going to find her, we need your help-”

“Chris-” the Sheriff tries.

“No.  Kate is out there right now doing god knows what to god knows who.  Most likely the citizens of Beacon Hills - _your_ citizens, Stilinski.  We can’t just wait around in case Hale _might_ or _might not_ remember something useful-”

“Now that’s enough, you can’t just-”

The two men continue to argue back and forth, but Derek really couldn’t care less.  A vice grip had slammed down around his head, making him curl forward.  He pushes the heels of his hands against his forehead, hoping the pressure will loosen the pain.  The only thing that happens is that his vision blurs around the edges and then the room spins.

“Derek!”

His vision blacks out.

* * *

 

Derek wakes out of breath and sore.  The pain in his head has dulled, but is still a slight throb between his temples.  He doesn’t know what happened and the more he tries to remember, the faster his heart races.

“Deaton’s on his way.  He said not to move him, to keep him on his side.”

“I thought this couldn’t happen to werewolves.”

“Yeah, well, we should have listened when Deaton said he needed to rest.”

He doesn’t know where he is, or who’s talking, or what happened to him.  Someone’s got an arm braced around his middle and he doesn’t know who it is.

_It’s her, it’s always her._

Derek tries to move, but his limbs lock up in pain and he loses his breath.  He tries to yell, to scream at her to get away from him, but he chokes on the words.

“Hey, don’t try to move or talk.  You’re gonna be okay, man, just relax.”

His skin is still too hot, sweat dampening his shirt.  He wants to move, to _get away_ .  Derek struggles to make his muscles cooperate and lets out a strangled cry when they won’t.  She gave him something again, she must have.  He doesn’t remember seeing the needle, doesn’t remember what color was inside.  Was it purple, pink, brown, or green?  He doesn’t _remember_.  If he knows the color, he knows what to expect.

But he doesn’t know, so he’s stuck lying helpless on the floor.  There’s more than one heartbeat, which means her friends have returned.  He can’t do it again, he _won’t_.

“Derek, can you hear me?”

_“Can you hear me?  Open your eyes, Derek.”_

“Stiles,” he gasps.

“He’s here, don’t worry.  But right now I need you to focus.  Look up for me.”

Derek is slow to react, terror still rushing through him.  When he manages to shift his gaze upwards a blinding light stabs into his retina.

_Too bright, too hot, she’ll never turn them off._

“No, no, turn it off, turn it off!” he yells, still gasping for air.

Derek rolls onto his other side, trying to scramble away.  She said he’d been good, she had turned off the lights, had let him finally sleep.  He doesn’t understand what he did to make them come back on.  His body still isn’t cooperating, slow to move, slow to _obey_.  She gave him something again, she must have.

“Derek, calm down, find your anchor.”

_Strong hands holding his head above water, gripping his shoulder, helping him up.  Bright eyes staring with anger, hope, concern.  Rapid words spilling from a sharp mouth._

“Stiles,” he gasps again.

“Yeah, buddy, I’m right here.”

Those amber eyes meet him at his level as the boy lies down on the floor with him.  Derek pretends it’s just the two of them like it always was in his dreams; pretends there’s no temple or coffin, no Kate, no pain, nothing.  There’s just him and Stiles, lying peacefully side by side.

“Six or five?” he asks quietly.

“What?”

Derek rests his hand between them, spreading out his fingers.  He can’t tell anymore which is the dream and which is reality.  Was his time with Kate just a long nightmare and he’s going to wake up back in his loft?  Or did that really happen and _this_ is the dream?  Maybe they never found him and he’s going to wake up with her hands on his body, readying him for another round of agony.

“Six or five?” he asks again.

Stiles frowns and looks from Derek’s hand between them to his face.  They hold eye contact and Derek can see him slowly begin to understand.  The corners of his lips tremble a bit as they pull down and tears well up.  The boy takes a moment to swallow it down before bringing a shaking hand to rest on Derek’s.  He slowly trails his fingers over Derek’s one by one.

“Count with me,” he says.  His voice was steady, a determined look in his eye.

“Stiles, I can’t-”

“One-”

“It won’t-”

“Two-”

“It needs to be _your_ -”

“Three.  Four-”

Stiles stops at four and waits.  Derek tries to breathe under the heavy weight of his gaze and is surprised to find it’s not that difficult.  This boy is the one who taught him this.  If he thinks that Derek’s body _won’t_ lie to him this time, then maybe Derek should finish the count.

A gentle finger taps his thumb once, twice.

“Five,” he says, barely above a whisper.

“Five,” Stiles confirms with a nod.  “You’re awake.”

“I’m awake.”

For the first time in months, he’s happy the answer is five.

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to comment or ask questions. If I've failed to tag or warn for anything, don't hesitate to let me know.


End file.
